Our View: Separate facts from fears on PARCC

Tuesday

Jun 17, 2014 at 6:30 PM

Massachusetts takes considerable pride in the success its public schools have had since the state put in place uniform standards and the MCAS testing regime in 1993. Bay State students have consistently led the nation in academic achievement — though not the world — in the years since.

Massachusetts takes considerable pride in the success its public schools have had since the state put in place uniform standards and the MCAS testing regime in 1993. Bay State students have consistently led the nation in academic achievement — though not the world — in the years since.

But good teachers don’t use the same lesson plans year after year, and good students don’t slack off because they made honor roll last semester. The MCAS system is over 20 years old, and it was far from perfect to begin with. Consider that the 10th grade MCAS tests, the original “high stakes” tests required for graduation, were designed to determine if the student was capable of doing 10th grade work — not whether he or she was prepared to succeed in college or the workplace.

The national Common Core standards, and the PARCC (Partnership for Readiness for College and Careers) tests developed to go with the standards, are designed to address several shortcomings. They assess skills, not just memorized facts, making it more difficult to cram and to cheat. They require students explain how they got their answers, moving the assessment beyond “multiple guess” questions.

The computer-based PARCC exam has been tested out in certain classrooms statewide, including in Taunton. It is up to local officials to decide by June 30 whether they will continue with a two-year field test and fully transition from the MCAS to PARCC.

While some of the opposition to Common Core and PARCC is reasonable – no educational strategy can satisfy everyone — much of it is infected with misinformation and politics. First, these are standards, not a curriculum. Decisions on how to attain them — curriculum and school management — will still be made at the district and state level. The standards define a floor for academic achievement, not a ceiling. They were developed by a consortium and adopted by states, not imposed by the federal government, and Massachusetts officials helped lead the process. State Education Commissioner Mitchell Chester is chair of the PARCC Governing Board and state Higher Education Commissioner Richard Freeland is co-chair of the PARCC Advisory Committee on College Readiness.

Just as the launch of MCAS tests 20 years ago generated more stress and controversy than proved justified, the decision by school committees whether to try out the PARCC tests next year has prompted heated debate. Parents and teachers must remember that these tests are diagnostic, a way to evaluate students, schools and the tests themselves. Students should no more worry about taking a diagnostic test than they do about seeing the doctor for an annual physical.

Standardized tests are just one part of evaluate academic performance, and they shouldn’t be the largest part. But test scores matter, for students closing in on their high school diplomas or for teachers in places where test scores are a part of the evaluation process. These “high stakes” should be approached with caution. We’ve just seen, in another area, the danger of putting too much weight on quantitative measures: At some VA hospitals, administrators are charged with falsifying records of patient wait times in order to qualify for performance bonuses.

A reasonable suggestion came this week from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which helped fund and promote the Common Core. It called for a two-year moratorium on using PARCC scores for “high stakes” decisions about students and educators. First, see if the tests adequately reflect the standards, and if the scores align with what teachers know about which students are excelling and which are struggling.

Leave the politics, ideology, high stakes and high stress out of it, keep an open mind, and learn about what the PARCC could mean for the future of educational assessment in Massachusetts schools. Students don’t need adults adding to the anxiety over new testing methods. While there are plenty of legitimate concerns over the PARCC, the focus should be on addressing any potential problems before it replaces the MCAS.

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